Ready, Aim, Fire
by BlackFrosted
Summary: The Black Widow's first mission back to work after her pregnancy leave. She is to apprehend Evelyn Salt and bring her to SHIELD HQ alive. The twist? Salt is hiding out an island known for its supernatural activity. (Twitter SL. BlackFrost hinted)


Natasha Romanoff's slick, black, wedge/combat boots silently moved across the parking lot at a local SHIELD HQ. Her head, adorned with straight, ginger hair, was held high, guns strapped to her thighs, and every small weapon one could think of safely tucked inside her specially made belt. It had been at least six months since the agent had been here, and she had missed it more than she knew. But when you've had a baby, certain things have to be attended to before one can work again. Yes, Natasha had a child, though she didn't understand how. She'd been told that it wasn't possible… but when in a relationship with Loki, anything's possible.

The redhead's gloved hand gripped the door handle of the SHIELD building, her ribcage expanding to allow room for the deep breath she'd just taken; she exhaled. This was her first time back in six months, and it was a feeling she couldn't quite describe. After a minute of clearing her head, she pulled open the door and trotted inside the large, gray building. Heads turned when she walked past desks, murmurs filling the air in the office rooms she went through. No one had expected her to show her face again, not after she had so carelessly allowed SHIELD to discover her relationship with the god of mischief. But Natasha had come back. She needed to come back. Her work was one of the few things that brought her joy, and she didn't give a dang if people looked at her differently. As long as she was happy, that was all that mattered to the agent. Natasha kept her head held high and her blue-green eyes in one direction; away from the on-lookers and gossiping interns. She was headed to Fury's office for her mission assignment, and she didn't have time to deal with those of lesser intelligence.

Fury's office door was a plain, silver, metal door, with the words 'DIRECTOR FURY' plastered on the front of it. To an agent like Natasha, those words meant that a friendly face was inside. But to anyone else, they were quite intimidating. A small smile crept its way onto Nat's lips at this thought as she pressed the buzzer button outside the door. A few seconds later the door unlocked and slid open, allowing her inside. She trotted up to the desk and stood at attention, her hands behind her back.

"Director Fury." She granted him a small nod.

"Agent Romanoff." The Director nodded back, looking up at the agent from his office chair. "It's good to have you back. Keeps the interns on their toes."

Another small smile tugged at Nat's lips, "thank you, sir. It's good to be back."

"Your latest mission is waiting for you on your desk. You'll be heading to Poveglia; one of our high risk's has decided to hide out there. You need to bring her back. Alive."

"Poveglia…" She repeated. Italy's most haunted island. Supposedly." She rattled off almost instantly, quite pleased that she knew this off the top of her head. "Bring her back alive. I can do that."

Fury raised a brow at how quick Nat was to rattle off trivia about the island; she'd obviously heard of it. "Right. Just don't get killed by one of the resident ghosts while you're there."

Natasha resisted the urge to roll her eyes, just nodding again instead. She didn't believe in ghost, or anything supernatural for that matter, and she wasn't about to start now. "I won't Director."

"You are dismissed then," the mad waved his hand in dismissal, and Nat trotted out of the room.

"Ghosts," she muttered under her breath as she made her way to her office. "As if something so stupid could scare me."

Sitting at her desk in her very own SHIELD office, Agent Romanoff had begun to look over her mission file. She studied every page, every word, as carefully as humanly, or super humanly, possible, taking small sips of a soda she'd gotten from a drink machine outside. Evelyn Salt, a Russian assassin had somehow managed to escape the high security SHIELD prison she was being kept in, and fled to the nearest place of refuge; the Italian island of Poveglia. Salt had been taken into custody after she killed over fifty US Government agents. Oddly enough, the woman had surrendered herself, and had actually caused no trouble during her prison stay. No trouble until she managed to strangle all of the men guarding her cell block, that is. If she had given herself up willingly, why the heck did she want to escape after all this time?

Evelyn Salt had come to the US when she was young as a Russian spy, and managed to infiltrate their government by landing a job with the CIA years later. She was part of a plan devised by the Russian's to take over the world. This plan was called 'Day X'. Salt was the perfect agent, save for the fact that she let herself fall in love. The woman, according to the SHIELD file, had followed Russia's 'Day X' plan to a T, until they killed her husband. Then she turned on them and began killing all the other 'Day X' secret agents. Salt was the only person who could find them, so SHIELD let her kill them off for a while, until they managed to track her down and apprehend her.

Natasha hummed in thought as she then began to look through the pictures the file contained. Her opponent was Russian and very skilled in combat; she figured this was why Fury had chosen her for the mission, since bringing people back alive wasn't something she normally did. Natasha was a spy, not a rescuer. But this was her mission, and she would follow instructions as best she could. She only hoped that Salt wouldn't put up too much of a fight and get herself killed.

Just a few hours after finishing her research on Salt, Natasha was on a plane, headed for Venice. It felt a bit strange to go to Venice without Loki, since they would always travel there together, but she went anyway. The redhead's blue/green hues were locked on the clouds outside the plane, her heart almost pounding in her chest. She wasn't nervous. She was excited. She hadn't been on a proper mission in so long… The familiar feel of adrenaline rushed through her veins and intensified the closer the plane got to the airport. Natasha was ready.

The plane touched down, and Natasha was quick to get off and head straight for her hotel room. She changed into her SHIELD cat suit once there, pausing in front of the full length mirror in the bathroom on her way out. A small smile tugged at the agent's plump lips at her reflection, her finger running over the Widow symbol on her belt.

"This is it, Romanoff." She whispered to herself, meeting her own eyes in the mirror. "Let's go." And with that, she trotted out of the room, headed for the boat docks. She didn't normally venture out in her SHIELD cat suit, but it was midnight, and pitch black outside, so this time was ok.

The island was unreachable by plane, and the Italian government never allowed boats to near the island because it was considered 'extremely haunted'. It was considered this, because in 1922-1968, it was used as a place to treat mentally ill and long-term care patients. The island was abandoned after this, and considered haunted because of all the people that had died there. This is why the Italian government wouldn't allow boats to approach the island. But of course, SHIELD had a boat of their own waiting for the Black Widow at the dock. This was the boat that Natasha had just boarded. Nat was curled up in the far corner of the boat, her expression unreadable.

"You always this quiet, Romanoff?" Asked the driver.

"I'm strategizing, Stan. Shut up."

"Geez, Nat. You never used to be so snobby.."

Natasha just rolled her eyes, remaining quiet the rest of the voyage. She had to strategize for this mission, and she had to make it perfect. She just had to.

Poveglia was just like Natasha had imagined; dark, cold, and it reeked of death. Not the decaying bodies smell, since all that remained of the once residents was skeletons, but the smell that hangs around cemeteries or funeral homes. That was one smell that made her blood run cold, and shiver rack her small frame. She hated the smell of death. It reminded her of her parents' death… She shivered again, swallowing a lump in her throat before stepping off the boat dock and onto the barren dirt beside it. The boat driver was long gone now, so she was alone here; just her, Salt, and the bones of thousands of people. Just the thought of being alone on a place like this was enough to make most normal people run in fear. But not Natasha. She wasn't like normal people; she wasn't afraid of anything. In fact, everything else should be scared of her.

Small pebbles crunched beneath the agent's boots as she made her way towards the remnants of the hospital there. If Salt were still here, and alive, Natasha figured that the woman might be hiding there. It couldn't hurt to look, at least. This was a big island, after all. And she had quite a few more buildings to check.

"Haunted…" Nat mumbled under her breath as she stopped in front of the broken hospital door. "That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard…" The agent just rolled her eyes and adjusted the night vision goggles she was wearing, before stepping inside the building. The place looked like a war zone. Everything was destroyed, windows broken, glass shards littering the floor; it honestly looked like a war had been waged here. But it didn't bother the Black Widow one bit; she actually kind of enjoyed being around carnage again. It almost made her feel…alive. Strange yes, but t'was the logic of the Black Widow.

Natasha had made it to the final floor of the abandoned hospital and so far there was no sign of life, but she could've sworn she heard footsteps behind her on more than one occasion. She'd spun around, gun drawn, but there was never anything there. She'd shrugged it off and continued on her search, but Fury's words about the island being haunted ran through her head.

"There's no such thing as ghosts," she mentally reminded herself after prying open a set of elevator doors. She could've sworn she heard children's laughter when she did that, but mentally slapped herself for thinking such. "You're losing it, Romanoff. Gods." Nat shook her head, huffing in agitation. She'd been at this for hours now, and so far all she'd found was rat's nest. …filled with dead rats. The agent went to pull up her digital map of the hospital, but a chair on the other side of the room flew across and into the wall right beside her. Immediately Nat drew her gun, her entire body on edge as she readied to shoot whatever had thrown the chair at her.

"Evelyn Salt, come out with your hands up." She commanded. "Now." Silence. This agitated the agent, and she slowly moved across the room to examine the area where the chair had come from. There was no way someone could hide over there. Not unless they were an inch tall…or invisible. With a calming exhale, Agent Romanoff holstered her gun. She began to wonder if she really /was/ losing it… "Odd…" Was all she said, before her body stiffened again. She heard it again; the sound of children laughing. "The h—l?" Natasha spun around, this time using her flashlight to try and find the source of the noise, but found nothing. By the elevator doors though, she caught the glint of light off of something that looked gold, and quietly trotted over to pick it up. What she saw made her stomach flip. It was a small, golden, and very dusty, plaque that read 'Children's Ward'. "No. No. There's no such thing as freaking ghosts." She told herself, but her shaky voice would've betrayed her, had she not been alone. The shakiness in her voice made her very agitated, and she flung the plaque across the room, stomping out of the hospital directly after. She was losing her mind. That was the only explanation…right?

The next few buildings Natasha searched were also empty, save for handwriting on dusty mirrors. One of them read 'GO AWAY', and another read 'you'll be sorry'. Of course, the agent assumed this to be Salt's attempt at getting her to leave, and continued in her search. But after searching nearly every building and coming up empty, the agent was convinced that Salt had left the island long ago. But she still had no explanation for the chair, the laughter, and now the voices she'd heard. She heard the voices when she entered the mental ward, and executed her search there as quickly as possible. She had no desire whatsoever to stay on this island anymore; she wanted to leave, and fast. But she couldn't. Not until- there. There was something that looked like… Yes! Salt! The woman was curled up, asleep outside the mental hospital. Nat grinned and managed to sneak up on the Russian, slip the cuffs on her wrists, then drag her to her feet. Salt said nothing, just glared at the SHIELD agent. Salt was apprehended again, and Nat wasted no time and activating her locater. Soon the sound of a helicopter could be heard above them, and SHIELD agents swarmed the two woman. Natasha escorted Salt back to the helicopter herself, where the woman finally spoke but a few words.

"Did you hear the voices too?"

Natasha just stared for a minute, before turning her blue-green irises towards the rising sun.

"You're crazy... I didn't hear anything…" Agent Romanoff had heard something, but she would never admit it. She was going home now, and she was /never/ going back to Poveglia again. Ever.


End file.
